Double Bass Gluing on a Neck on a Palatino

[Hermitfeather]

Hello!

My wife bought me a Palatino Bass last Christmas and it had a small crack in the neck. I've played it in a few orchestra's and concerts since then and the crack has gradually grew and started to look like it was gonna collapse on itself. I've tried reaching out to a few Luthiers but haven't had any luck getting a hold of them so I decided to try my hand at repairing it. I bought a mallet and tapped the base of the neck a few times (after removing the strings) and 2 of the 3 sides almost completely released their hold. I slowly worked the other side out with some alcohol and a thin piece of metal from a phone repair kit until it gave out. Now that I'm at this point, I want some advice before continuing...

1. Is this hide glue from upton bass sufficient for this type of repair? Instrument Glue Granular Hide Glue
2. Is it worth trying to remove the last half inch or so of the neck base to attach it to the rest of the base? I was considering 1/2" dowel to do that if I were to do so.
3. Would it be wise to leave the half inch of neck base and have dowel go through to the back for extra rigidity in the repair?
4. Is the gap between the sides and the back of the neck base okay? Should I fill it in with anything?
5. How long would the hide glue need to rest after it's applied?
6. I've heard a little about neck angle, is this as important for a bass that's already been assembled and being repaired?
7. When gluing the neck back on I plan to use a clamp from the front to the back as well as a strap around the body for tension, should I leave this on for the entire duration of the glue setting process or for only part of it?

Thank you for any advice or tips.

 

[GretschWretch]

Most of your questions are far over my head, but you better give that glue at least twenty-four hours to set and dry.

 

[DoubleMIDI]

1. The glue is right. You need to learn how to prepare it.

2.-4. You can see at that stuck part of the neck, that there are gaps on both sides. This seems to be the case for the rest of the neck too. Hide glue does not work for filling gaps, but that part should use hide glue or the next accident will break the neck itself or the upper part of the bass body. So these gaps should be filled with solid wood (over the whole neck pocket).
The parts need to be cleaned from glued on wood and glue first.
Making a clean neck pocket where the neck just slides in with no gaps might not be easy for DIY, because the neck pocket needs to have be cleaned, some wood removed to get a plan surface and wood added to fill the gap.
Personally I would ask a luthier to do that as this is a common repair that shouldn‘t be too expensive.
NO dowels. The grain will be in a different direction and that can break the wood with humidity changes.

5. 24 hours dry time is right.

6. The neck angle is important. Think of the bridge height needed with a different neck angle. But a fitting pocket is as well. Maybe you also need to shim the middle area too to get the best contact area there with the right neck angle.

7. The idea with clamping is good, but you need to try is without glue first as the clamp might slip. Maybe with some rubber and a custom made piece of wood to get the fingerboard side parallel to the underside of the neck pocket will do the trick.

The work is the fine tuning of the pocket so the neck slips in with no gaps. The current pocket is too wide, so shimming is needed.
You need to care for a lot of things (neck angle up/ down and left/right, no gaps) when removing wood from the added shims. That is the thing I would leave to an experienced bass luthier. In your case it is not only a reglue (or your problem will happen again soon) but to make a new neck pocket.
Call a luthier and ask how much it would cost go correct a too wide neck pocket and reset the neck. The luthier might need to see the instrument personally to give a final price, but with the pictures he might get a first impression.
Experienced amateur luthiers can do that kind of repair, but it would probably be a lot more work than you currently think.

 

[dperrott]

If you just glue it in, that doesn't address the issues of why it came out in the first place. You have to check the fit and most importantly is the fingerboard centered? Its a very tricky job to do. Chances are you may need a new bridge or bridge work as well. The bridge was made according to the board position, any change will alter the relationship.

 

[Hermitfeather]

1. The glue is right. You need to learn how to prepare it.

2.-4. You can see at that stuck part of the neck, that there are gaps on both sides. This seems to be the case for the rest of the neck too. Hide glue does not work for filling gaps, but that part should use hide glue or the next accident will break the neck itself or the upper part of the bass body. So these gaps should be filled with solid wood (over the whole neck pocket).
The parts need to be cleaned from glued on wood and glue first.
Making a clean neck pocket where the neck just slides in with no gaps might not be easy for DIY, because the neck pocket needs to have be cleaned, some wood removed to get a plan surface and wood added to fill the gap.
Personally I would ask a luthier to do that as this is a common repair that shouldn‘t be too expensive.
NO dowels. The grain will be in a different direction and that can break the wood with humidity changes.

5. 24 hours dry time is right.

6. The neck angle is important. Think of the bridge height needed with a different neck angle. But a fitting pocket is as well. Maybe you also need to shim the middle area too to get the best contact area there with the right neck angle.

7. The idea with clamping is good, but you need to try is without glue first as the clamp might slip. Maybe with some rubber and a custom made piece of wood to get the fingerboard side parallel to the underside of the neck pocket will do the trick.

The work is the fine tuning of the pocket so the neck slips in with no gaps. The current pocket is too wide, so shimming is needed.
You need to care for a lot of things (neck angle up/ down and left/right, no gaps) when removing wood from the added shims. That is the thing I would leave to an experienced bass luthier. In your case it is not only a reglue (or your problem will happen again soon) but to make a new neck pocket.
Call a luthier and ask how much it would cost go correct a too wide neck pocket and reset the neck. The luthier might need to see the instrument personally to give a final price, but with the pictures he might get a first impression.
Experienced amateur luthiers can do that kind of repair, but it would probably be a lot more work than you currently think.

Thanks for all the info. I'll keep trying to reach out to a luthier to get a quote. I noticed the glue wasn't going all the way down to the bottom of that joint after it was removed.

If you just glue it in, that doesn't address the issues of why it came out in the first place. You have to check the fit and most importantly is the fingerboard centered? Its a very tricky job to do. Chances are you may need a new bridge or bridge work as well. The bridge was made according to the board position, any change will alter the relationship.

As DoubleMIDI mentioned and can be observed in the pictures, the neck wasn't set flush on really, any of the sides. When It was still attached, it would twist with the tension of the strings. Leading to a gap on the side opposite of where I'd stand and play. Is that an indication that there's a problem elsewhere as well? All 4 corners of the bass body don't sit on the ground, only 3 and it'll rock to the other if motivated so I don't think the body is exactly square.

 

[dperrott]

Thanks for all the info. I'll keep trying to reach out to a luthier to get a quote. I noticed the glue wasn't going all the way down to the bottom of that joint after it was removed.



As DoubleMIDI mentioned and can be observed in the pictures, the neck wasn't set flush on really, any of the sides. When It was still attached, it would twist with the tension of the strings. Leading to a gap on the side opposite of where I'd stand and play. Is that an indication that there's a problem elsewhere as well? All 4 corners of the bass body don't sit on the ground, only 3 and it'll rock to the other if motivated so I don't think the body is exactly square.

The neck wont necessarily be flush to the mortise side walls. The walls are angled and the neck block isn't. The bottom of the neck and the floor of the mortise must be flat. Then changes must be made to make sure the neck is centered. It is a very difficult, time consuming, and detailed job. I wouldn't say it is for a beginner or the faint of heart!

 

[SAlcott]

If you'll divulge your location, we can probably find a luthier who can do the job. If you try to do it yourself, and it doesn't go well (the most likely outcome), removing the unsuccessful repair will add to the cost of what looks like a fairly straightforward job.

 

[Don Kasper]

As someone with a moderate level of "non-professional" woodworking and metalworking experience and skills, I'm constantly surprised and shocked at the level of DIY Luthier Hurbris (tm) that appears on the fine pages of TB/DB.
There is "DIY", and there is "SIUY" (Screw It Up Yourself".)
IMFO, of course.

 

[KUNGfuSHERIFF]

Your primary problem is that your bass lacks anything I would recognize as a neck block. The neck heel itself looks reasonable, but rather than fitting into a mortise (basically a pocket) the heel is just sitting on a block of mystery wood, which guarantees mechanical failure because the “joint” was starved of glue.

Having the top taken off and a proper block fitted will significantly exceed the value of the bass. I never say this, but if you want to save the instrument you may be forced to epoxy the SOB and hope for the best. Epoxying a neck set is the nuclear option. If you screw it up, goodbye playable bass. Use West Systems T-88 only if you do.

 

[DoubleMIDI]

The neck joint is meant to get released if the neck gets a hard impact. If it doesn’t because the joint is too strong (epoxy) the neck or the top of the body will break and the repair might either be expensive (too expensive for a Palatino) or simply impossible.
Glueing in a neck with a good pocket is easy for a luthier and not very expensive. In your case it needs to be rebuilt and that costs a bit more.

Using epoxy might be easier, but if it goes wrong you have a larger piece of garbage. With a good neck pocket and hide glue you (or a luthier) can remove the neck and correct.
I would only try using epoxy if the cost of a professional repair is significantly higher than the value of a new instrument.

Your bass might even sound better if the repair is done professionally which will increase the value of the instrument.
(Keep the pics and the luthier invoice to be able to show the badly attached neck to explain why the value of the repaired instrument is higher than a new Palatino.)

 

[Rebop]

West Systems T-88

T-88 is System Three. If going with West System you'll want 105 resin with 209 hardener.

 

[walterw]

Having the top taken off and a proper block fitted will significantly exceed the value of the bass. I never say this, but if you want to save the instrument you may be forced to epoxy the SOB and hope for the best. Epoxying a neck set is the nuclear option. If you screw it up, goodbye playable bass. Use West Systems T-88 only if you do.

i'm no kind of bass luthier but my first thought is that if we're really down to "homebrew fix or throw it away" then wouldn't this be a good place to experiment with bolting the thing on? at least that way mistakes could conceivably still be corrected

 

[turf3]

The one thing I'd say is to get you some sample pieces of wood - the maple of the neck is easy; you may need to take the bass to Woodcraft or equivalent to get some educated guesses on the material of the neck block - and TEST TEST TEST your hide glue technique on these scraps till you're confident you can make a good solid hide glue joint in your sleep. Glue two pieces up, let cure, break them apart, inspect the break, repeat repeat repeat. Use a thermometer on the glue pot.

If the rest of the neck was fitted into the pocket the way the broken-off bit is, you have no chance of holding it in place until that fit is corrected. Not even the best epoxy will fill that kind of a gap and remain creep-free indefinitely. I expect the solution is to enlarge the neck pocket, backfill with some shims of the right species, then fit the new slightly smaller neck pocket to the tenon of the neck, and only then glue the neck into the pocket.

 

[turf3]

Your primary problem is that your bass lacks anything I would recognize as a neck block. ...

How can you tell this? It looks like SOMETHING's there for the neck to have been connected to. It might be mystery meat wood, but there's SOME kind of a block there. Seems to me you'd have to get a mirror and a light and look up at the neck block area from inside to really know what the block up there is like. Of course if it's as poorly fitted to the ribs and top and bottom as that broken-off bit of neck is to the pocket, well..

As a mechanical engineer, I'd look at this thing (zero value at present, near zero value even when fixed up) as an opportunity to try a bolt-on neck. To me that seems less risky than the "epoxy it in and if it's not right you throw the whole thing away" approach. But, I wouldn't be paying someone to fab the bolt-on joint, I'd be designing and making it myself. If you had to pay someone then it would REALLY be a negative ROI proposition.

 

[WG Plum]

If ever there was a bass to attempt a homebrew fix on a Palatino is it. I say this as someone who played a Palatino for ten years. They're just not worth sinking a ton of money into.

 

[KUNGfuSHERIFF]

turf,

I can tell because I looked at the OP’s photos and there simply is no neck pocket. There’s a shelf, and the ends of the ribs sweep up and over it to make it look like a bass that was built properly.

Agreed that this instrument is a prime candidate for a bolt-on conversion should the owner want that.

 

[walterw]

I can tell because I looked at the OP’s photos and there simply is no neck pocket. There’s a shelf, and the ends of the ribs sweep up and over it to make it look like a bass that was built properly.

having never taken apart an upright i didn't see that until you pointed it out but yeah, an actual neck block would have been one piece of wood surrounding the neck tenon instead of that flat shelf with the separate sides covering up the lack of actual sidewalls

 

[BPM Strings]

If I were going to fix that, this is what I would do.

1. I would remove the part of the neck heel that is still in the mortice.

2. Fit some fresh wood to the back of the heel to replace what was just removed from the mortice. Make this replacement 3 to 5mm longer than needed to give you something to remove for fitting later.

3. Clean all the old glue from the mortice and neck. (Maybe clean up the neck before step 2).

4. Fit spruce fillers into the sides of the mortice. This will address the issue that KungFu Sheriff raised. These fillers should be slightly oversized to provide something to remove for fitting.

5. Check that the sides of the heel are straight. The new piece that was added to the back of the heel in step 2 should be planed flush with the bottom and sides of the heel. If the sides of the heel are concave then plane off around 3mm or more and fit some maple, then make that straight and flat and blend it in with the rest of the heel. These pieces should go over the piece added in step 2.

At this point you should have a rebuilt heel and mortice all cleaned up and ready for fitting. You can then fit the neck in the normal way.